Bomber, Donner

Singing Along With the Gap Band
(Yes, I’m making you work for this one)

Or
Shiite Outta Luck

Or
Sunni-Set

Or
Iraq the Casbah
Imported insurgent leader Abu Musab al Zarqawi has gone on to collect his virgins, having died of natural causes at the age of 39. Death being the natural biological reaction to two 500-pound bombs being dropped on your shack, even if it takes a little while and includes trying to roll off a stretcher. His death comes a little more than a month after his blooper reel recruitment video, where he had trouble figuring out how to work a machine gun, and the resulting loss of street cred apparently turned fatal. Reportedly, al Zarqawi was ratted out by other members of the insurgency – speculation has focused on his older brother Fredo al Zarqawi. Authorities have announced that they will be paying off on the $25 million reward for information leading to his death or capture, so he literally was worth more dead than alive. Zarqawi was believed to have masterminded the bombing of a hotel in Jordan in 1999, the UN headquarters in Baghdad in August 2003, the assassination of a U.S. diplomat in 2002, the beheading of Nick Berg in 2004 and to have personally beheaded British hostage Ken Bigley in October 2004. He also was behind countless suicide attacks that targeted American soldiers and innocent civilians alike, so lying in a pool of his own blood in a pile of rubble is a case where the punishment fit the crimes. His death was hailed as a potential turning point, the 98th in the course of the Iraq conflict leaving the U.S. pretty much where it started. With Zarqawi’s death, Ann Coulter takes over as the America basher we least want to hear from.

While everyone really benefits from this one, Tom’s appropriately titled Addition by Subtraction benefits the most, taking 20 points with the solo hit to pull into a tie for 14th. This was the 19th hit of the year, tying for the 2nd most successful campaign in GHI Dead Pool history.

Donner Blitzed

Or
Leadership Change in the Friends of Venus
Robert Donner, best known as Exidor, one of television’s greatest characters, has died of a heart attack at the age of 75. Mork (of & Mindy fame) met the insane Exidor in the show’s fourth episode as he moved into the flophouse headquarters of Exidor’s invisible Friends of Venus, often not seen riding around Boulder on Exidor’s invisible burro. The Friends accompanied him everywhere, causing logjams as they entered rooms and blocking Exidor’s view, prompting him to shout, “Mork, is that you?” even when Mork was standing right in front of him. Other roles for Donner included Milt, a member of the McLeod gang in El Dorado, one of my favorite Westerns; barn-burning, hard-drinking, boot-legging, chicken-stealing Walton family friend Yancy Tucker, MacGyver’s neighbor’s brother Milt, the preacher in High Plains Drifter, idiot thief Fingers O’Toole in Disney knock-off Catalina Caper and Boss Shorty on Cool Hand Luke.